Knights and Merchants: The Peasants Rebellion

A very unique RTS game, Knights and Merchants: The Peasant Rebellion is the standalone expansion to one of the finest strategy games ever made. It might not be winning any originality contests, but the way this game manages its varied gameplay mechanics is nothing short of impressive.

While most games in this genre focus more on the combat aspect, Knights and Merchants is unique in that it delivers a finely crafted economic simulation. With the inclusion of even more buildings and unit types, The Peasant Rebellion complements an already amazing game with tons of valuable content.

Economics of War

In Knights and Merchants, players take the role of the captain of the palace guards, leading the citizens and military forces of your kingdom to victory. The Peasant Rebellion offers additional scenario missions for the game’s campaign, with these missions having a clearer focus on the narrative aspect.

Now that the nobles have declared a rebellion against King Karolus, it will be up to the player to restore order to the kingdom. To do so, the player will have to balance not just the King’s armed forces, but also the entire economy and services of the kingdom.

Much like Age of Empires II: The Conquerors] , the game is played from a pseudo-3D point of view with basic polygons for the units and prerendered polygons for the scenery. Additionally, the game’s skill trees are quite basic in comparison with other RTS games – progress is made mostly through the construction of new buildings.

Unlike other RTS games, however, Knights and Merchants features an impressive approach to unit limit that’s nothing like what Age of Empire does. Instead of having a clear limit as to the number of units a player can have, this limit is entirely dependent on the food resources available to the player.

Daily Checks

The economy is the most important aspect of The Peasant Rebellion. Every unit and citizen in the game has an upkeep cost that has to be paid with food. Any unit that spends enough time without food will be lost, forcing skilled players to keep a close eye on food production if they hope to amass a considerable army.

Along with food production and overall economic features, players will also have to keep in mind that the roads and town designs need to be kept in mind in order to maximize efficiency.

Every building must be connected to a road to create an efficient merchant network, much like in any city building game. Of course, there are also military units and battle strategies to keep in mind during gameplay – should diplomacy and economy fail, that’s when the cavalry takes care of business.

With its medieval setting and charming yet simple visuals, Knights and Merchants: The Peasant Rebellion offers an interesting alternative to the standard RTS gameplay loop. If you’re tired of having to focus all of your efforts on military victories playing Age of Empires, then definitely consider giving this game a try.

Pros

• Excellent economy mechanics
• Balancing food and resources can be challenging but fun
• Great campaign mode story

Cons

• Unforgiving AI
• Basic skill trees
• Plain and uninteresting visuals